


when everything comes crashing down (you’re all i know)

by katebishoop



Series: tumblr prompts [9]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, F/M, Forgiveness, Hurt/Comfort, Protectiveness, Season/Series 03 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-05
Updated: 2016-03-05
Packaged: 2018-05-24 22:25:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6168946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katebishoop/pseuds/katebishoop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarke comes back, and Arkadia has straightened itself out. But blood must have blood is the policy again, and the clans want those responsible for the massacre.</p><p>But there is one that Clarke won't let them get their hands on.</p><p>--<br/>Spoilers from Season 3<br/>Written before 3x08</p>
            </blockquote>





	when everything comes crashing down (you’re all i know)

**Author's Note:**

> **anonymous asked:** Can you give us protective!Clark over Bellamy. Once this Pike nonsense passes, the clans want blood. She may not have been able to save Finn, but she will save Bellamy.
> 
> anon you pain me. here ya go.
> 
>  
> 
> **spoilers for Season 3**

When the gates of Arkadia open in front of her, she’s both shocked and relieved to see Kane.

“Clarke?” He sounds just like Clarke feels. His eyes slide over to Murphy, bleeding and leaning into her on the back of the horse. “Come inside, quick.”

“Lexa’s dead.” That words are rough in her throat. It is not the first time she’s said it outloud. Murphy had made her say it on their journey here: she’d been lagging, no motivation or desire to go on, and he’d screamed at her, _ say it, say it and move on - don’t you dare give up _ . “We don’t have much time to fix this before the new Commander is chosen.”

Kane’s mouth opens slightly, but then he shuts it again and rakes a hand over his beard.

“We’ve got a lot to talk about.” He finally says, and holds out a hand to help her dismount.

* * *

“Lexa’s arrangement should still stand.” She is clinical with Kane, finally fulfilling her role as an ambassador. “But they’ve no doubt gone back to  _ jus drein jus daun _ , so we have no choice but to  hand over-”

Clarke stops dead in her tracks in the doorway of the chancellor’s office when she sees him.

He’s sitting, hunched forward on the couch in the corner; he is holding his head in his  _ good  _ hand, the other is hanging limply out of a sling tied around his shoulder. But when he hears her voice, his head snaps up. There’s bruises around his eyes, and a redness that she knows isn’t from any physical wounds. There’s cuts and gashes all over his face; some of the blood is dried, some of it isn’t.

Neither of them can look away from each other - neither of them can speak. Kane is the one who has to break the silence.

“Bellamy,” Kane’s already backing out of the room, “can you fill Clarke in? I need to go to medical, to check on John…”f

The door clangs shut behind him, causing a harsh echo that has her flinching.

When she first came back to Arkadia to meet with him, she thought she knew what she was getting into. But she’d been wrong.

And she has no idea what to expect now.

Bellamy shifts uncomfortable at the edge of the couch. He pursues his lips, then shakes his head. All she can do is watch. She feels like she’s in the middle of a minefield right now.

Then, he scoots over so that he’s at one end of the couch and looks up at her.

Clarke goes and sits at the other end, the distance between them much more than a simple two feet of couch space. 

“What do you do when you realize that you’re not the good guy?” His voice is the same as it was, a life time ago, next to her with his first kill at their feet.

She can already feel the tears pricking at her eyes. “Maybe there are no good guys.” 

It is a lesson she had to learn the hard way a long, long time ago. 

“I…” Bellamy won’t look at her, and she wants to reach out to touch him, but she can’t. Not yet. “I thought that Pike - I thought that I was doing the right thing. I thought I was  _ protecting  _ everyone. But then… Monroe was killed-”

Clarke takes a sharp intake of breath; she did not know Monroe very well, but she was one of  _ them _ , and now she learned, yet another one of them was dead. 

“-and he threatened Octavia. I couldn’t-” Bellamy holds his hand over his eyes. “no matter what I do- people  _ die _ when I’m in charge. I’m a  _ monster. _ I’ve _ always _ -”

“ _ Bellamy _ ,” Clarke’s hand darts out and squeezes his knee, and she can feel the tension. He’s shaking, and she’s shaking too, but there is still conviction in her voice, “You have never,  _ ever  _ been a monster, you hear me?”

She means that, even though everything between them has gone to hell. Even after the massacre - he had tried to spare the wounded, he had succeeded in sparing Indra. He’s more than what he thinks he is. Always has. But yes, she had been angry with him, and she tried not to think about him, to get lost in…

But she had never give up on him. That had never went away, and it wasn’t going to now.

“You don’t get it-” Bellamy’s whole body racked with sobs. “ _ Lincoln’s dead _ .”

All the air leaves Clarke’s lungs.

“He- he got caught in the crossfire - there was nothing- he’s  _ dead _ -”

The last she saw Lincoln, it was the back of his head as he marched with Octavia back through the gates of Camp Jaha. The last time she had interacted with him was the walk back, a curt nod but soft eyes. She doesn’t remember the last time she spoke to him. But the admission of his death shakes her - another loss, one with ripples that will go on long after him.

_ Octavia. _

She doesn’t dare ask.

Clarke swallows. “If you need forgiveness-”

“No-!  _ Clarke! _ ” Bellamy flinches, his whole body jumping in his seat, shying away from her, away from her hand. “This isn’t something that you can just  _ fix _ with that! I don’t  _ deserve _ -”

“Look at-  _ Bellamy _ \-  _ look at me _ ,” Clarke jumps up onto the couch, her knees under her. She grabs his good arm and prys it away from his face, holding it down; she’s a bit rough with his shoulder to get him to face her. His eyes are wide and full of tears. And fear; she sees fear there and it breaks her heart. “Forgiveness isn’t about what people deserve.” She gives him a little shake when he looks away, “look at me-  _ forgiveness isn’t about what people deserve _ . It’s about letting go and moving on and trying to put something back together again and living again and-” She’s crying full force onto him now. 

“I forgive you,” Clarke’s voice cracks. “I’m always going to forgive you - I see the good in you and nothing you can do will change that. We need you-”

“Octavia doesn’t,” Bellamy gulps, his eyes are far off, and his voice is small, “she hates me, she… she did this…”

Clarke looks down at his body: the broken arm, the scrapes, the blood.

“Bellamy…”

“I deserve to die, Clarke,” Bellamy closes his eyes, tears still falling out down his bruised and bloody cheeks, “I’m  _ dead to her  _ so there’s not point. I am going to be with Pike and them-” An alarm goes off in Clarke’s head.  “-and face what I have done _. _ ”

She hadn’t even considered - she knew that they’d have to give over Pike and them, but Bellamy as being a part of that had never occurred to her. Bellamy was _Bellamy -_ off limits.

Clarke swallows down the lump in her throat, “No, no - don’t you _ dare _ say that. You’re not them. That isn’t who you are-  _ Bellamy _ -”  

She recalls Finn tied to the stake, her knife in between his ribs, and she recalls Lexa, with a bullet meant for Clarke in her chest. And she feels it deep in her bones and in her boiling blood and searing across her scars, the conviction:  _ no _ .

Not again.

“Don’t you dare give up,” She echoes the words that Murphy had screamed at her. They had helped her, and damn, she would get them to help him. “I can’t lose you. You are not allowed to die, you hear me? I know we can fix this. Together.  _ Bellamy _ .”

She rubs her thumbs in circles on his cheeks, but he shakes his head, a whole new wave of sobs over taking him.

The dam breaks in Clarke too, and she’s throwing her arms around his neck, clutching him tightly to her chest. She feels his good arm come up behind her back to grip her like a lifeline.

“I can’t lose you too, okay?” Clarke cries into his neck, “I  _ can’t _ , Bellamy.”

* * *

“You are missing one.” Titus says. The firekeeper is hovering over the new Commander; trained as a nightblood, but still green with command. “There were ten of them.”

Clarke straightens. “These are people responsible.”

In front of her, the heads of argo station are on their knees, bound and gagged. Pike. Gilmer. Monty’s mother.

(Monty’s cries flash in her mind - he had turned back to Kane’s side too, no longer agreeing with her, but that was still his mom, the only family he had left. And here Clarke was, bringing her to a fate worse than Finn’s would have been).

“Enough games,  _ Wanheda _ ,” Titus demands, “Where is Bellamy Blake?”

“He went back to Kane and helped with the coup,” Clarke grits out, “He had wanted to spare your wounded, and he did convince Pike to spare Indra, the  _ Commander kom Trikru _ . He is not innocent - but he is not guilty enough to be a part of your vengeance.”

Clarke tilts her head to the side. She knew this would be brought up, and she’s prepared. She’s feeling absolutely murderous, a fury of determination. She’s a viper waiting for the perfect moment  to strike. “You  _ do  _ remember Lexa’s last command, don’t you?”

Titus’ whole body tenses, and the young boy shifts uneasily on the throne next to him.

“You are never to lay a hand on me again,” Clarke’s voice is steel, each word like the sharpening of a knife. “Attack him, and you attack me.”

The new Commander -  _ Aden _ , Clarke is pretty sure - shifts. If Lexa’s spirit is truly in the chip that’s in him now, if he can really access the past commanders’ lives, then he recognizes her words. He knows their meaning, because Lexa had said those words about her.

“Blood will not have Bellamy Blake’s,” the Commander says to her, and for a split second his eyes change color to one that makes Clarke’s heart ache. “Guards - escort the prisoners out.”

Clarke doesn’t move as the guards file out. She catches the glare from Pike - and it’s so strange to her how this man before her was former school teacher, but the ground changes you. Pike was on the wrong side of change.

“Thank you for your cooperation,  _ Wanheda _ ,” Aden says, “with their deaths, we can work towards peace among the thirteen clans.”

Now  _ that _ , she doesn’t even know about. But right now war is halted and her people are safe.

Bellamy was safe.

She makes to leave but Titus’ voice stops her.

“In accordance with Lexa’s last request,” he says, his voice devoid of emotion, “I feel the need to offer you a word of advice: love, is weakness. See that it does not kill you like it did Lexa.”

Clarke slowly turns to face him. She is as hard and unfeeling as stone: “No, Titus - Lexa didn’t die because she loved. She died because of you.”

And with that, she storms out of the tent.

* * *

When she and Kane get back to camp, she goes to the medbay first, to check on Murphy. He slurs some gibberish at her, his fist swinging limply. Her mother assures her that he’s fine - hopped up on painkillers and in need of rest.

“He’s in Linc- he’s in Octavia’s old quarters,” her mother tells her, and Clarke knows she isn’t referring to Murphy. “It’s locked from the outside.”

Her mother presses the key into her palm. She knows that Bellamy is not a prisoner - no, he is in their for his own protection, from the Coalition and from himself.

He’s on the floor in the corner when Clarke opens the door. He’s just as haggard as before, but he is no longer crying. Even that river had to dry at some point.

The last time they were in this room together it hadn’t been pretty. It still wasn’t, but at least they were back together. 

Clarke sits down on the floor next to him and weaves her arms around his shoulders. He immediately tucks himself into her side.

“You’re safe, now,” Clarke whispers, “it’s over.”

Bellamy sniffles. “Did you see…?”

_ Octavia. _

“No,” Clarke tells him, and that’s the truth. She had seen Indra but not her second. Maybe she was somewhere else in their camp? Or maybe she had finally left to parts unknown? Clarke didn’t know. “I’m sorry.”

“I’m the one who should be apologizing.”

Clarke runs her fingers through his curls. “We’ve both got a lot to apologize for.”

They stay like that for a while, but somehow Bellamy ends up lying on his back with her head in her lap.

The bruises on his face are more yellow now, but she knows he’ll feel them long after they’ve faded.

“You’re…” Bellamy bites his lip, and Clarke can’t help but think how he looks so young, and so small, “you’re staying… right?”

Clarke’s hand ghosts over his jaw line. “Yeah,” she breathes out, “I’m - I’m tired of running. I have to face this.”

_ This: _ her guilt, her choices, her mistakes, her demons, her people, her home. Him.

“I’m not leaving you again,” Clarke looks directly down into his wide, brown, broken eyes. “I’m - I’m not losing you again. We’ll get through this together - like we always do. Like we should have done in the first place.”

Bellamy scrunches his eyes shut. “Can we figure it out later?”

Clarke breathes out a long, tired sigh. “Whenever you’re ready.”

They had a long road to go, but still, being  _ together _ , physically - it was a drastic improvement from before. And Clarke was going to make sure that nothing came between them again.

**Author's Note:**

> come hang out over on [tumblr](http://bellakeyblake.tumblr.com)!


End file.
